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The Truth About Cars is dedicated to providing candid, unbiased automobile reviews and the latest in auto industry news.Fri, 20 Mar 2015 17:19:42 +0000en-UShourly1http://wordpress.org/?v=4.0.1The Truth About Cars is dedicated to providing candid, unbiased automobile reviews and the latest in auto industry news.The Truth About CarsnoThe Truth About Carseditors@ttac.comeditors@ttac.com (The Truth About Cars)2006-2009The Truth About CarsThe Truth About Cars is dedicated to providing candid, unbiased automobile reviews and the latest in auto industry news.The Truth About Cars » tvhttp://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/wp-content/themes/ttac-theme/images/logo.gifhttp://www.thetruthaboutcars.com
Daewoo! The Lost Art of Macho Korean Car-Commercial Voiceovershttp://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/2013/02/daewoo-the-lost-art-of-macho-korean-car-commercial-voiceovers/
http://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/2013/02/daewoo-the-lost-art-of-macho-korean-car-commercial-voiceovers/#commentsWed, 20 Feb 2013 14:00:08 +0000http://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/?p=478191Daewoo never had much of a presence in the United States, though I do see the occasional Nubira in the junkyard. That’s too bad, because Korean-market Daewoo ads of the 1970s and 1980s have some of the manliest/cheeziest voiceovers in car-advertising history. Let’s take a look at some examples of the genre. This LeMans GTE […]

]]>Daewoo never had much of a presence in the United States, though I do see the occasional Nubira in the junkyard. That’s too bad, because Korean-market Daewoo ads of the 1970s and 1980s have some of the manliest/cheeziest voiceovers in car-advertising history. Let’s take a look at some examples of the genre.

This LeMans GTE ad features weedly-weee action-movie guitar, a pleather-clad babe executing a pseudo-J-turn, and an attack helicopter. Let’s compare it to the US-market ad for the same car, which was sold as the Pontiac LeMans.

There’s a babe with product-enhanced hair driving to the beach, but the entire feel of this ad is one of diminished expectations. Clearly, GM should have brought over some of Daewoo’s Korean marketing wizards.

Back in South Korea, the ’86 LeMans showed the way to a hard-hitting, testosterone-pumped future. It’s like a kick in the teeth from Syngman Rhee himself!

Not that Daewoo didn’t get a bit touchy-feely with this “sell stuff to the world” ad, but at least they brought in a deep-voiced hired voice and then added serious echo to it.

The Maepsy was a member of the Opel Kadett/Isuzu Gemini family, which means we’re looking at what amounts to the Korean Chevette. At the 1982 Daewoo board meeting depicted in this ad, the suits are flat awed by this car. Imagine if this ad had been adapted to the American marketplace for the 1982 Chevette. Maepsy!

Instead, here’s how Chevettes were sold that year. Hell, it’s enough to make a man want to buy a Fiat Strada!

If we fast-forward to the late 1990s, the US-market Nubira could have benefited from this approach. Note the badass voice of the yokel mechanic, as mandated by the Daewoo Macho Voice Creed.

]]>http://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/2013/02/daewoo-the-lost-art-of-macho-korean-car-commercial-voiceovers/feed/10We Deserve A Good Car Moviehttp://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/2013/01/we-deserve-a-good-car-movie/
http://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/2013/01/we-deserve-a-good-car-movie/#commentsTue, 22 Jan 2013 14:34:51 +0000http://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/?p=474726As a child with a 1:24 scale model of the first generation Viper constantly adorning my bedroom amongst other automotive related furnishings, my eyes were glued to the Viper television series. It was full of horrible dialogue, campy acting, and a car that transformed (I wonder where they got that idea from?) into a V10 powered, […]

As a child with a 1:24 scale model of the first generation Viper constantly adorning my bedroom amongst other automotive related furnishings, my eyes were glued to the Viper television series. It was full of horrible dialogue, campy acting, and a car that transformed (I wonder where they got that idea from?) into a V10 powered, crime fighting caricature of itself. I was 10 years old when it first appeared on TV, so I didn’t care about the obvious insert of a disabled African American male in a wheelchair to appease focus groups. Nor did I care about stupid weapons which were probably taken straight from the dusty script of a failed Star Trek pilots.

In my lifetime, I have yet to see a good, live action, car themed television show. Just look at the last Knight Rider reboot or The Transporter for proof. Even worse, the movie studios want you to spend big money to watch fantasticfailures on the big screen which will make you shout at inaccuracies and pine for a movie exec to get it right for once.

In my almost 30 years of life, I have been lucky to enjoy the classics: Vanishing Point (the original), Grand Prix, Gone In 60 Seconds (the original, not the Cagey version), and Bullitt. I wasn’t alive when they first came out, so I have no idea if they were critically acclaimed films or flubs when they were first shone on the silver screen. And, honestly, I don’t care. They’re still better than the ultra-CGI colon polyps of today. Hell, Ford even built a Bullitt-style Mustang in recent years. Can you see Volkswagen resurrecting the “Fast and Furious” Jetta? Even if they did, you’d absolutely hate them for it. I’d give props to Ferrari for building an Eddie Griffin Edition Enzo though, sans nose, even if it was only for a laugh.

But, what makes all recent movies and TV shows with any sort of petrol-fuelled theme suck so much?

Attention to detail.

As soon as I see a car do something that obviously couldn’t be done without the assistance of Industrial Light and Magic waving their digital wand over it, I automatically hate it. The absurd crashes in Driven? The horrid dirt road drag race in Biker Boyz where Laurence Fishburne and Derek Luke are able to have a conversation with each other while riding at full clap? Redline?

Give us the car chase in Ronin. Hell, even Days of Thunder wasn’t too bad. I could go for a rental car smash up derby along Daytona Beach any day over watching Stallone hum to himself on the race radio while lifting dimes off the road with his rear tire. Just give us something correct.

]]>http://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/2013/01/we-deserve-a-good-car-movie/feed/74Chrysler Has A City To Sell To Youhttp://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/2011/02/chrysler-has-a-city-to-sell-to-you/
http://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/2011/02/chrysler-has-a-city-to-sell-to-you/#commentsMon, 07 Feb 2011 11:54:27 +0000http://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/?p=383122Chrysler is proud of the fact that they did NOT release their Super Bowl ad on YouTube like most of the others. “While many sponsors revealed their advertising plans for Sunday’s Super Bowl, the Chrysler brand remained tight lipped to create a stronger impact for the reveal of their new marketing and advertising campaign featuring […]

Their unprecedented 120 second spot (in the advertising world, that counts as feature-length) supposedly sold the new 2011 Chrysler 200, and (we gave you fair warning) introduced the brand’s brand new tagline, “Imported from Detroit.”

Chrysler should apply for funds from Detroit’s city development agency, because the ad is mainly an ad for Detroit, with the Chrysler 200 as a product placement. Why? As the off speaker says, “Because when it comes to luxury it’s as much about where it’s from as who it’s for.”

Chrysler is playing a risky gamble with this ad. The power of the national identity of a brand is overvalued, and often, it turns into a liability. This is why large international brands usually try the utmost to disassociate themselves from where they are from. With everybody knowing that the Italians are calling the shots at Chrysler, the gamble becomes twice as risky.

No wonder that Detroit is ecstatic about the ad. “Detroit had a presence on that very important national stage — and a message,” jubilates the Freep. However, the Detroit paper had to concede: “Don’t know if it will sell cars. But Sunday night, it sold a city.”

Like any audacious gamble, it could be a win or a lose. Give us your odds.

]]>http://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/2011/02/chrysler-has-a-city-to-sell-to-you/feed/81Anything To Forget You’re In A Chryslerhttp://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/2009/10/anything-to-forget-youre-in-a-chrysler/
http://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/2009/10/anything-to-forget-youre-in-a-chrysler/#commentsThu, 29 Oct 2009 15:50:45 +0000http://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/?p=333491The post Anything To Forget You’re In A Chrysler appeared first on The Truth About Cars.
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